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The Psychology

of Office Space(Knight & Haslam)

8th April 2009

IPSIS workshop

Overview

History of office design

BBC News CatalystExperimental Data

Where Next?

Psychological

Research into

Identity and

Space

Management

P

R

I

S

M

“The Holy Grail”

(Horne)

Office Improvements

Tangible Benefits

Relocation

New people

Incentives

Downsizing

Restructuring

Management initiatives

Time of year

Colour scheme

Success/failure of local team

Etc

NOISE

Realities of contemporary office space

Flexible office territory

• Multiple workstation access (hot desking)

• Area depersonalization (clean desk/shared desk policy)

• Lack of a home space

• Creation of artificial group boundaries

• Diminution of personal and group agency

Office Development

• Pharaoh’s Scribes

• Medieval Monks

• Dickensian Bank Clerks

Space Management &

Identity Realization

• Increasing workplace

surveillance since early 20th

century

• 1860s

• 1890

• 1915

- Taylorist (Taylor, 1911) principles of consistency ,

standardization, and efficiency

- Development of High surveillance Low autonomy

office environments

The Modern Office?

2008 1906

Panopticon

• Bentham 1783

• Covert continual surveillance

• Clusters of inmates

Office RealityBBC 15th November 2006

• New rules in tax offices mean desks must be free from clutter to

promote “lean, efficient business processing".

• Revenue and Customs staff cannot have food at their desks

• Non-essential items targeted include money, memorabilia and packed

lunches

Office Reality

• "Lean is all about offering a betterservice to our customers and staff. Itis a key element in HMRC's plan toprovide improved service and meetefficiency targets.” (HMRC)

• Staff at Revenue and Customs(HMRC) have condemned "hare-brained" plans to remove items suchas family pictures from work areas toboost productivity.

Survey findings

! Survey of UK office workers (Ns = 34, 61, 104, 302, 1,643) (Knight & Haslam, 2009)

Autocratic

Management

Sick Office

Syndrome

Organizational

Identification

Ambience

Decisional

involvementJob Satisfaction

Stress

Absenteeism

Staff Turnover

-

+

-+

-

+

-

+

-

The Experiment

Drawbacks of Survey Instruments:

•Self report

•Correlational

•No causation

•No control

•No observation of behaviour

Workplace Experiment

- experiment 2

The experiment

3 Hypotheses:

• H1 — Decorating/designing a workspace will (a) increase workers’organizational identification and (b) enhance productivity/satisfaction

• H2 — Empowering workers to decorate or design their own workspacewill (a) increase organizational identification and improveproductivity/satisfaction still further

• H3 — Compromising workers’ autonomy within the workspace willreduce organizational identification and compromise performance/satisfaction.

Task #1

Sorting (Information management/

information processing)

• A mixed pile of memoranda

• Sort back into chronological order

• Read for understanding

• Answer 15 multiple choice questions

• As quickly and accurately as you can2) What is Martin Chamberlain’s position in the company?

3) Who is Martin Chamberlain’s immediate boss?

10) In which town/city is Hexagon Taps located?

13) Which two offices flank the sales manager’s office?

Task #2

Letter Identification

(Attention to Detail)

• A one-page magazine article.

• Strike out all the lower case letters

‘b’ as quickly and accurately as

you can

Task #3

Organizational Citizenship Behaviour

• Between 0 – 10 tasks may be

passed (without prejudice) onto a

busy colleague

• 5 Negative

• 5 Positive

• Differences between conditions.

Deal with a problem employee

Handle a failing product delivery programme

Downgrade product quality to save company money

Decide on a reduction in headcount

Handle the fallout from an industrial accident

Book the Christmas Party

Go to an awards dinner

Be responsible positive company publicity

Chair a prestigious committee

Attend a Dubai Conference

Task #4

Questionnaire INSTRUCTIONS

This questionnaire consists of a number of statements each with its own scale.

These scales allow for seven shades of meaning from disagree completely to

agree completely. For example, if you agree quite strongly with a statement you

would cross the sixth box in the scale like this

Before you begin, please be assured that all your responses will remain

anonymous and confidential

If you have any questions, please ask them now. Otherwise, please turn the page

and begin.Attitudes and feelings

Participants complete questionnaire:

80 questions = 14 scales

• Organizational identification

- I identify with the organization that’s running this experiment

• Control

- (During experiment) I had control over my environment

• Sick room syndrome

- The air in the room was stuffy

• Organizational Citizenship Behaviour

- If these were my normal working conditions I would stay behind to do extra work if necessary,

even if I wasn’t paid overtime.

• Motivation Scale- I wanted to do well in the tasks

• Ambience Scale

- I felt ‘at home’ in the room during the tasks

Condition 1: Lean (Bare) office

• Participant undertakes the tasks in a lean space

• No decorations

Condition 2: Enriched office

• Participant works in a decorated space

• S/he cannot change the room design

Condition 3: Empowered office

• Participant is asked to decorate the space in which they will work

• S/he can choose 0–6 pictures

• … and add 0–6 plants

Condition 4: Compromised office

• Identity is realized as in Condition 3

• Identity is then compromised by the experimenter

• The participant then works under the conditions imposed by the experimenter

?

Well BeingRelationship between Space management, Identity Realization and Well-being

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

Bare Enriched Empowered Compromised

Concentration

•Assessed in terms of (a) ease of concentration

Concentration:F(3,108)=5.26,

p< .01, !2=.13

response

scale

! Study of UK office workers (Ns

= 112, 47) (Knight & Haslam, in

prep)

Well BeingRelationship between Space management, Identity Realization and Well-being

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

Bare Enriched Empowered Compromised

Concentration Ambience

•Assessed in terms of (a) ease of concentration, (b) ambience

Concentration:F(3,108)=5.26,

p< .01, !2=.13

Ambience: F(3,108)=15.95,

p< .01, !2=.31response

scale

•I felt at home

•The room felt soulless

•The room had a good

•I felt comfortable

•atmosphere

! Study of UK office workers (Ns =

112, 47) (Knight & Haslam, in

prep)

Well BeingRelationship between Space management, Identity Realization and Well-being

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

Bare Enriched Empowered Compromised

Concentration Ambience Sick Office

•Assessed in terms of (a) ease of concentration, (b) ambience and (c) sick office

syndrome

Concentration:F(3,108)=5.26,

p< .01, !2=.13

Ambience: F(3,108)=15.95,

p< .01, !2=.31

Sick Office: F(3,108)=13.54,

p< .01, !2=.27

•The air was stale

•The room was stuffy

•The room was too hot

•The light was too brightConclusions

!Enrichment and Identity Empowerment increase well-being

!But not when ‘management’ violates identity-realization

response

scale

! Study of UK office workers (Ns

= 112, 47) (Knight & Haslam, in

prep)

Organizational IdentificationRelationship between Space management, Identity Realization and Organizational Identification

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

Bare Enriched Empowered Compromised

Organizational Identification

•Assessed in terms of (a) organizational identification scale

Organizational Identification

:F(3,44)=4.29, p< .01, !2=.23

response

scale

! Study of UK office workers (Ns

= 112, 47) (Knight & Haslam, in

prep)

Conclusions

!Enrichment and Identity Empowerment increase a sense of

Organizational Identification

!But not when ‘management’ violates identity-realization

•I feel strong ties with the organization

that is running this experiment

•I identify with the organization

that is running this experiment

Organizational Citizenship BehaviourRelationship between Space management, Identity Realization and

Organizational Well-being

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

Bare Enriched Empowered Compromised

Positive Negative Total

•Assessed in terms of (a) positive tasks retained, (b) negative tasks retained and

(c) total number of tasks retained

Negative Tasks:

F(3,43)= 4.20, p< .01, !2=.23

Total Tasks Retained:

F(3,43)= 4.77, p< .01, !2=.25

Tasks

retained

Conclusion

!Enrichment and Identity Empowerment increase Organizational

Citizenship Behaviour

! Study of UK office workers (Ns

= 112, 47) (Knight & Haslam, in

prep)

ProductivityRelationship between Space management, Identity Realization and Productivity

-35

-25

-15

-5

5

15

25

35

Bare Enriched Empowered Compromised

Memoranda Letters 'b' Total time

•Assessed in terms of (a) memo sorting, (b) letter counting (c) overall performance

and errors.

Memos: F(3,43)=3.70,

p< .01, !2=.26

Letters b: F(3,43)=4.45,

p< .01, !2=.30

Overall: F(3,43)=4.58,

p< .01, !2=.24

Conclusions

!Enrichment increase productivity

!Identity Empowerment increases productivity still fu

rther

!Faster performances do not mean more errors

%

variation

40.5m

33.5m

27.5m

37m24

20

17

24

! Study of UK office workers (Ns

= 112, 47) (Knight & Haslam, in

prep)

ConclusionsConclusions

• Data challenges the idea that productivity can only be achieved through high surveillance and a

lack of autonomy.

• In fact, the opposite may be true — a lack of autonomy (and an associated lack of input into

managerial decision making) would appear to compromise well-being.

• The outcomes of standard, office management approaches can be very costly (in both economic

and social terms).

• These studies (and the theory they support) point to the need to involve employees in the design of

work space allowing for the expression of valued identities.

• Space management (e.g., business, architecture, design) needs to move from a philosophy of

identity imposition to one of identity realization.

ConclusionsConclusions

• Data challenges the idea that productivity can only be achieved through high surveillance and a

lack of autonomy.

• In fact, the opposite may be true — a lack of autonomy (and an associated lack of input into

managerial decision making) would appear to compromise well-being.

• The outcomes of standard, office management approaches can be very costly (in both economic

and social terms).

• These studies (and the theory they support) point to the need to involve employees in the design of

work space allowing for the expression of valued identities.

• Space management (e.g., business, architecture, design) needs to move from a philosophy of

identity imposition to one of identity realization.

Older adults in care

Happiness and (apparent) health of the residents

4

5

6

7

4w- 4w+ 4m+

Happy empHappy enrHealthy empHealthy enr

F(2,24)=22.50, p<.001, !2p=.69

Total appearance means in the home’s sitting

rooms at 11am and 7pm

0

50

100

4w- 4w+ 4m+

EnrichedEmpow ered

F(2,24)=15.38, p<.001, !2p=.56

Identity

Realization

Productivity

Well Being

+

+

+

(Knight & Haslam, 2009)

Good workspace design? Results to date Good workspace design? Results to date

Good design?Good design?

OrganizationalOrganizational

GroupGroup

IndividualIndividual

Want to become involved?

• www.prism-identity.com

• 01392 247 903

• cpk201@ex.ac.uk

The Psychology

of Office Space(Knight & Haslam)

8th April 2009

IPSIS workshop